History
History of ISHS
The Indian Sailors’ Home, Mumbai was outcome of lengthy consultation between the Government of India and the Government of Bombay as to the most suitable way of perpetuating the memory of the Indian Seamen who lost their lives in the service of the British Empire in the Great War of 1914-18 and Second World War of 1939-45.
The construction work was started in November, 1930, and the Home was opened by His Excellency Sir Frederick Sykes, P.C., G.C.I.E, G.B.E, K.C.B., C.M.G., Governor of Bombay, on the 16th December,1931.
The management of the home was vested in the Indian Sailors’ Home Society which was incorporated under the Indian Companies Act,1913, on 3rd May 1933 as a private Company (an association not for profit).
The Society was later taken into voluntary liquidation and with the concurrence of the Government of India was re-incorporated under the same Act and with the same aims and objects on 10th August 1948.
The Chief architectural feature of the Home is the Memorial Hall, a simple but very beautiful octagonal room on the walls of which are suspended the bronze tablets presented by the Imperial War Graves Commission and containing the names of the Indian Seamen who fell in the war and the ships in which they served. Surrounding the room, above the tablets , runs the following inscription in bronze lettering:--
“ Here are recorded in lasting honour and remembrance the names of 2,223 seamen of the Royal Navy, Royal Indian Marine and the Merchant Navy who fell in the Great War and whose grave is the Sea.”
Evolution and Expansion
The residential portion of the home consists of two wings with a paved triangular courtyard dividing them. Each wing has a ground and two upper floors.
By the end of 1944, the collector of Bombay, on behalf on the Government of India requisitioned of land adjacent to the Home for the construction of temporary barracks for accommodation additional seamen who were expected to visit the port. Subsequently it was decided by the Government of India to construct a permanent building for the accommodation of Indian seamen according to modern standards. The work was stared in June 1945 and the building was completed in 1949 complete with all the necessary furniture and fitting.
The Home and the Hostel thus provide a long-felt necessity and are worthy memorials, both in purpose and design, of the gallant men whose devotion to duty are recorded on their walls.
